The amendments to Art.311(2) and R.15 in 1977 and 1978 did not affect any pre-existing rights of the petitioner.

1. While working as Sub Post Master at Mattupetti the petitioner was charge sheeted on 12-12-1974 for alleged shortage of office cash. His explanation to the memo of charges was found unsatisfactory, and a departmental enquiry was ordered. During the enquiry the petitioner requested for the assistance of another employee, P. Balakrishnan by name, but that request was declined on the ground that he was already assisting two another employees. A similar request for the assistance of one D'Cruz was also turned down for the same reason. The enquiry officer found the petitioner guilty as per report dated 11-3-1979; and by Ext. P8 order dated 31-3-1979, he was dismissed from service. His appeal to the Post Master General was also dismissed, as per Ext. P10. This Original Petition is directed against Exts. P8 and P10.

2. The findings were concurrent, and even Mr. Radhakrishnan for the petitioner did not urge, with any amount of confidence, that they could be disturbed by this Court in the present proceedings.

3. A point was however raised that by declining to arrange for assistance by Messrs. Balakrishnan and D'Cruz, the authorities had denied reasonable opportunity to the petitioner to defend himself. R.14 (8) of the Central Civil Services (Classification, Control and Appeal) Rules, 1965 provides that a delinquent employee can take the assistance of another Government servant to present his case, but the "Note" thereto adds that such other Government servant should not have "two pending disciplinary cases on hand." Balakrishnan and D'Cruz had admittedly two such other cases on hand, and the action of the authorities was therefore in accordance with the Rules. The petitioner has no case that assistance by any other Government servant of his choice was denied; it is even conceded at the hearing that another such servant was actually assisting him at the enquiry. The complaint regarding denial of reasonable opportunity, based on R.14(8), cannot be sustained under the circumstances.

4. The only other contention is that the petitioner should have been given a second opportunity to show cause against the proposed penalty, despite the amendment of Art.311(2) with effect from 3-1-1977, and of R.15 of the Classification, Control and Appeal Rules, in August, 1978. The argument is that the petitioner had a substantive or constitutional right to the second opportunity when proceedings were initiated in 1974, and that the subsequent amendments were powerless to deprive him of such a right, unless they were retrospective.

5. Art.311(2), as it stood before the Forty-second Amendment, and so far as is relevant for the present purposes, was in these terms:

"(2) No such person as aforesaid shall be dismissed or removed or reduced in rank except after an enquiry in which he has been informed of the charges against him and given a reasonable opportunity of being heard in respect of the charges and where it is proposed, after such enquiry, to impose on him any such penalty, until he has been given a reasonable opportunity of making representation on the penalty proposed, but only as the basis of the evidence adduced during such enquiry."

The relevant provisions after the amendment are these:

"(2) No such person as aforesaid shall be dismissed or removed or reduced in rank except after an inquiry in which he has been informed of the charges against him and given a reasonable opportunity of being heard in respect of those charges.

Provided that where it is proposed after such inquiry, to impose upon him any such penalty, such penalty may be imposed on the basis of the evidence adduced during such inquiry and it shall not be necessary to give such person any opportunity of making representation on the penalty proposed:"

And R.15(4) of the Classification, Control and Appeal Rules, after the amendment of August, 1978 reads:

"(4) If the disciplinary authority having regard to its findings on all or any of the articles of charge and on the basis of the ev